BOSTON, MARCH 12, 2014…..The MBTA’s planned 5 percent fare increase will likely be assessed across-the-board, although officials are looking at ways to shield seniors from the increase, General Manager Beverly Scott told the News Service.

"We’ve been looking at really being across the board," said Scott who said there had been discussions about providing "a little relief for the youth." She said, "We kept it very simple."

After hearing from several youths calling for a discounted fare card, the Massachusetts Transportation Board on Wednesday approved a preliminary MBTA budget of about $1.9 billion, which includes 284 new positions, 165 related to new service such as late-night, said MBTA Chief Financial Officer Jonathan Davis. He said there will be a full conversion of employees to the state-administered Group Insurance Commission by July 1 – a health savings initiative the T has tried to complete since 2009.

"The budget is balanced. This is a year that I don’t need to come to you and say, ‘We have a $180 or a $160 million deficit,’" Davis said. He said a portion of the operating budget would pay for capital improvements with a focus on "accessibility improvements."

Transportation officials’ interest in a youth pass for discounted MBTA fares has given at least one transit activist more resolve to see that goal become a reality.

"We’re not going to stop until we get it," Tyree Ware, a 22-year-old from Dorchester, told the News Service. Ware, who said he has been calling for a youth pass for the past seven years, has now aged out of the proposal.

Backers of the youth pass say it should cost $10 per month and be available to young people between the ages of 12 and 21.

Transportation Board Chairman John Jenkins said he was interested in the idea of a youth card.

"We are going to have it. The question is what’s it look like. Let me restate: I believe we’re going to have it. We’re going to try to have it, but let’s see if we can reach a common ground," Jenkins said.

The MBTA is undergoing a larger look at a variety of changes to fare structures, which Scott said created some conundrums.

"Everybody comes back and says they don’t want to be the one," Scott said. She said, "The whole issue of who pays – and taking that as a collective, because at the end of the day someone pays – is a conversation, a review that you cannot do effectively as just one-offs."

At the Wednesday meeting, advocates for lower fares for The Ride and others voiced support for the young people’s demands, as well.

Ware, who now works for the Roxbury Environmental Empowerment Project, said MBTA fares were a burden when he was younger, without work and sometimes watching buses drive past him.

Page 2 of 2 - "All they’re doing is making us hold them to it," Ware said, who said the prospects for success appear less likely after seven years. He said, "They’re basically letting us know that their word means nothing."

Luis Navarro, a 16-year-old from Dorchester attending the meeting after a half-day of school, said a pass available to students, which is limited to school days from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. is too constricting.